Ex-girlfriends are bad news. That's true in real life and it's true on The Vampire Diaries. This week Katherine and Rebekah cause trouble for Stefan while Anna causes problems for Jeremy.Oh yeah, and Alaric dies again.

Now that Stefan has to deal with Klaus and his kid sister Rebekah, things are twice as hard for him. They get even harder when Gloria does a spell to track down the necklace. She finds it but doesn't tell Klaus because she wants it for herself. Since Stefan isn't talking, Gloria has no choice but to take off his shirt, cut him open and torture him with a vervain chest massage. It's the least sexy shirtless Stefan scene ever.

Luckily he has help in the form of another ex-girlfriend, Katherine. She's in town and wants to help with Stefan's diabolical plan, so she kills Gloria. But Stefan still isn't willing to team up with her again. As is always the case, if Katherine can't have Stefan, she'll settle for Damon, so she heads back to Mystic Falls, tricks Bonnie into giving her the necklace, then talks Damon into teaming up with her.

Meanwhile, Stefan's big evil plan is just playing hard to get so Rebekah falls even more in love with him and tells him all about the mysterious hunter who scared Klaus in the 1920s. We learn his name is Michael, but then Rebekah figures out Stefan's deception. Instead of killing him, Klaus gets creative and brings him back to Mystic Falls, where bad things are definitely going to be happening next week.

Damon and Elena

Back in Mystic Falls, Elena and Damon are getting closer, joking around about chili. The episode consists of everyone trying to get Damon to be nicer, more like Stefan, but that only makes him mad. He even kills poor Alaric (who is wearing his magical ring) to prove that he's still bad. Elena is fighting feelings for him, but Damon' unwillingness to change is putting a serious damper on the hopes and dreams of millions of Dalena fans

The New Council

This week's event is a Founder's Potluck at the Lockwood mansion, and despite the fact that Damon compelled Caroline's dad to forget everything, Bill reveals that he can resist vampire compulsion and now wants to take over the council. That doesn't sit well with Damon who tries to kill him, but Caroline saves her daddy. You'd think that saving his life might change his mind, but even as Bill leaves town, he's still convinced that Caroline will never be OK again. And despite not being a member of the Founding Families, Alaric forces himself onto the Council because humans need to stick together.

Jeremy's Ex

Jeremy spends a lot of time talking to Anna about the "other side" and how Vicki represents some sort of "darkness." It's all vague and Jeremy isn't sure he wants to tell Bonnie because the ghosts mean that Jeremy still has feelings for Anna. But Jeremy eventually does the smart thing and tells Bonnie about seeing his dead ex-girlfriends. Bonnie then tries to tell Elena, but she accidentally tells Katherine instead.

Next week on The Vampire Diaries: Stefan has nine minutes to kill Elena. Some seriously bad stuff will definitely be going down.